By Chad Love

About this time every year, when the redbuds start blooming, the toms start strutting and the white bass start running upriver, I must deal with coat issues. My chessie has one of the densest coats I’ve ever seen, far thicker than any of my other chessies, my old lab or virtually any other dog south of the Arctic circle. I've always joked that she’s the musk oxen of the canine world. I don't complain during duck season, because neither icy water nor thorn-tipped thickets can penetrate her coat. But eventually, the bill for that dense coat comes due, in the form of a period of time in the spring when her winter coat starts blowing out. It starts with a dull sheen to her coat, perhaps a little tuft here and there, floating on the breeze, caught on the fence. But like the first few gentle flakes that precede a raging blizzard, those innocent-looking fuzzballs are the advance guard, the shock troops for an annual deluge known around my house simply as “the shed.”

I try to minimize and control it. I brush her endlessly, filling garbage sacks, dumpsters, and entire landfills with dead fur, all to no avail. For several weeks we live in a sort of floating brown haze. Birds, squirrels and field mice from a three-county area converge on my house for the warmest nest-building material around. My entire wardrobe, regardless of cloth, becomes a sort of sedge-colored mohair. And then finally, after three weeks or so of near-constant grooming, brushing, sweeping, raking, bathing and more brushing, a sleek new dog sporting a shiny summer coat emerges from the hairy fog.

This year, however, I decided that I was going to dispense with shedding season altogether and perform a preemptive full-body shave, something I've never before attempted with a dog. I chose Monday as S-day, a warm, sunny, windless day that would be perfect for shaving a large, hairy, recalcitrant canine. Then, on Monday, as I was about to do battle with millions of hair follicles, I got the forecast for Tuesday. Plunging temperatures. Snow. Freezing rain. Sleet. Single-digit windchills. So here I sit Wednesday morning with a quarter-inch of ice coating every outdoor surface, fruit trees with dead, frozen, useless blooms, and one very happy, very hairy old dog who gets to enjoy her winter wardrobe for one more week. I guess the moral of this story is twofold: One, someone needs to shoot that damnable groundhog, and two, make sure warm weather is here to stay before breaking out the clippers.

Anyone else give their dog(s) a preemptive spring trim? If so, when do you usually do it?

Photo by RLHyde on Flickr

Comments (11)

from Dcast wrote 8 weeks 4 days ago

My lab is constantly shedding enough hair to clothe the poor year round. I've tried everything that supposedly helps with shedding to no avail. We're resigned to the fact that we must sweep 2-3 times a day and here in the next month 4-6 times a day. I seriously doubt shaving will do anything but make the hair shed harder to sweep up because they're half the size they were before, but let us all know your outcome.

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from mayoaaron wrote 8 weeks 4 days ago

my labs live outside so I don't have to worry about sweeping up hair but just brushing them until the shedding stops

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from haverodwilltravel wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Shedding Setters make terrific tumbleweeds of hair that gather quickly into Cotton Candy size clumps. When I had Setters with a Lab, his spiky black hair would stick out of the Setter Tumbleweed making it look like I was infested with Hedge Hogs.

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from -Bob wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

I’m sure I’m opening myself up to all sorts of abuse, but here goes – have you considered a Standard Poodle? I’m talking about the big ones, not the little yap-machines in the chi-chi foo-foo haircuts.

Smart, fast, no stinking, no shedding…just a session with the clippers every eight weeks or so to keep them from looking like Cousin It.

There you go. Have at it. -Bob

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from Dcast wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Bob, my wife and I really like the labradoodles and goldendoodles. I'm not a big fan of the standard poodles because of their looks! Yeah, I know vain!

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from Ontario Honker ... wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Yep, I see quite a future for those doodle dogs.

We got hit with another blizzard this morning. Left 8" heavy snow on the ground. My French Brittany pup is a shedding machine but her hair is so thin that I would hesitate to shave her, especially this early in the year.

The Furminator brush helps quite a bit, especially with the vacuum attachment accessory. Pricey though ($70+).

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from chadlove wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Dcast, I was talking more about my dog's annual winter coat blowout as opposed to regular shedding. You're right, you'll never get rid of shedding, it's just a cross we have to bear.

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from Blue Ox wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Get a velocity dryer. Take the shedding dog outside, (trust me on this)and bathe her. Drying with the velocity dryer will blast the winter coat off all at once.

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from -Bob wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Dcast, totally understandable. Dogs are not a "one size fits all" proposition, which I suppose is why there are so many breeds available.

We got a giggle a couple of years ago when we stopped by the PA Cabela's location with our apricot Standard in tow. We had several people in the parking lot ask us what breed he was -- when we said he was a Standard Poodle one guy argued with us, insisting he was a Golden Doodle..."Poodles don't look like that." Hello?

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from Jere39 wrote 2 weeks 6 days ago

Best I can tell, this was/is the last Man's Best Friend blog posted, and is now over a month old.
Chad, If you're still around: Is the Blog retired, shut down, eliminated, or just on hiatus?

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from PanzerIV wrote 1 week 6 days ago

We'd trim our Britts every spring - they would shed like crazy. Got to agree with the fellow about the standard Poodles - no shedding, no muss, just trim the face occasionally.

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from -Bob wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

I’m sure I’m opening myself up to all sorts of abuse, but here goes – have you considered a Standard Poodle? I’m talking about the big ones, not the little yap-machines in the chi-chi foo-foo haircuts.

Smart, fast, no stinking, no shedding…just a session with the clippers every eight weeks or so to keep them from looking like Cousin It.

There you go. Have at it. -Bob

+2 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from Dcast wrote 8 weeks 4 days ago

My lab is constantly shedding enough hair to clothe the poor year round. I've tried everything that supposedly helps with shedding to no avail. We're resigned to the fact that we must sweep 2-3 times a day and here in the next month 4-6 times a day. I seriously doubt shaving will do anything but make the hair shed harder to sweep up because they're half the size they were before, but let us all know your outcome.

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from mayoaaron wrote 8 weeks 4 days ago

my labs live outside so I don't have to worry about sweeping up hair but just brushing them until the shedding stops

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from haverodwilltravel wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Shedding Setters make terrific tumbleweeds of hair that gather quickly into Cotton Candy size clumps. When I had Setters with a Lab, his spiky black hair would stick out of the Setter Tumbleweed making it look like I was infested with Hedge Hogs.

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from Dcast wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Bob, my wife and I really like the labradoodles and goldendoodles. I'm not a big fan of the standard poodles because of their looks! Yeah, I know vain!

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from Ontario Honker ... wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Yep, I see quite a future for those doodle dogs.

We got hit with another blizzard this morning. Left 8" heavy snow on the ground. My French Brittany pup is a shedding machine but her hair is so thin that I would hesitate to shave her, especially this early in the year.

The Furminator brush helps quite a bit, especially with the vacuum attachment accessory. Pricey though ($70+).

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from chadlove wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Dcast, I was talking more about my dog's annual winter coat blowout as opposed to regular shedding. You're right, you'll never get rid of shedding, it's just a cross we have to bear.

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from Blue Ox wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Get a velocity dryer. Take the shedding dog outside, (trust me on this)and bathe her. Drying with the velocity dryer will blast the winter coat off all at once.

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from -Bob wrote 8 weeks 3 days ago

Dcast, totally understandable. Dogs are not a "one size fits all" proposition, which I suppose is why there are so many breeds available.

We got a giggle a couple of years ago when we stopped by the PA Cabela's location with our apricot Standard in tow. We had several people in the parking lot ask us what breed he was -- when we said he was a Standard Poodle one guy argued with us, insisting he was a Golden Doodle..."Poodles don't look like that." Hello?

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from Jere39 wrote 2 weeks 6 days ago

Best I can tell, this was/is the last Man's Best Friend blog posted, and is now over a month old.
Chad, If you're still around: Is the Blog retired, shut down, eliminated, or just on hiatus?

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from PanzerIV wrote 1 week 6 days ago

We'd trim our Britts every spring - they would shed like crazy. Got to agree with the fellow about the standard Poodles - no shedding, no muss, just trim the face occasionally.

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All submitted comments are subject to the rules set forth in our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.